1 Introduction to Medical Anthropology ANTH 162 Winter 2016 M,W 2-3
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Introduction to Medical Anthropology ANTH 162 Winter 2016 M,W 2-3:20pm 182 LIL Professor: Dr. Sara Lewis GTF: Jonathan Turbin Office hours: Wednesdays, 3:30-5:30pm [email protected] and by appointment Office hours: Mon 3:30-4:30; Thurs 12-1 356 Condon [email protected] James Daria [email protected] Office hours: Mon &Weds 12-1 All GTF office hours are in 365 Condon Course Description: This course asks: how is health at once a biological, social, and historical fact? The field of medical anthropology aims to understand concepts of health and illness across cultures and over time. We will focus on contemporary issues in the United States as well as across the globe, and in particular how social inequality impacts health across populations. To better understand how social factors shape health and illness the course explores a variety of topics related to body and mind. The course pays special attention to how rapidly growing population changes and new technologies in an age of globalization shifts the burden of disease and generates new ethical quandaries. We will also investigate how different sorts of practitioners, including doctors, healers, shamans and mystics approach health and illness. This introductory course is highly interactive and is appropriate for anyone interested in medicine, culture, politics and society. By the end of this course, students will be able to: Explain the role of culture in the experience and conceptualization of health and illness. Interpret how social factors shape the incidence and diagnosis of illness. Evaluate contemporary ethical quandaries related to medicine, technology and the body. Interrogate how social inequality produces health disparities. Explain how social theory generates new understandings of health and illness. Course Expectations and Grades: Quizzes (end of week 3 and 8), 5% each for a total of 10% Midterm Exam (In Class, week 6), 25% Final Exam (Take Home, due March 14), 30% Discussion Section Exercises (5 total, pass/fail), 20% Discussion Section Participation, 15% 1 Grades Below is a rubric to help you understand grading in the Department of Anthropology. There is no extra credit. A+: Quality of student’s performance significantly exceeds all requirements and expectations required for an A grade. Very few, if any, students receive this grade in a given course. A: Quality of performance is outstanding relative to that required to meet course requirements; demonstrates mastery of course content at the highest level. B: Quality of performance is significantly above that required to meet course requirements; demonstrates mastery of course content at a high level. C: Quality of performance meets the course requirements in every respect; demonstrates adequate understanding of course content. D: Quality of performance is at the minimal level necessary to pass the course, but does not fully meet the course requirements; demonstrates a marginal understanding of course content. F: Quality of performance in the course is unacceptable and does not meet the course requirements; demonstrates an inadequate understanding of course content. Late and Incomplete Work Please notify Professor Lewis in advance if you are unable to take an exam or submit an assignment. Make-up exams and extensions will not be granted without a documented excuse, such as a written note from your doctor. Accommodations Please contact Professor Lewis during the first week of the term should you require accommodations. Class Culture The culture of this class is based on mutual respect, decorum, and a sense of openness and curiosity. You may use laptop computers and tablets as you see fit, however please be sure to bring a pencil and paper to every class, which we will use for in-class exercises. Lectures will be highly interactive and students will be called upon at random. Members of the class are welcome and encouraged to email the professor and the GTF with questions. However, you may be redirected to attend office hours should your question require a more involved response. 2 Academic Honesty The following actions may result in disciplinary action according to the university’s academic honesty policies: --Evidence of collusion when expected to submit individual work (working with someone else). --Evidence of plagiarism (using someone else’s work without proper citation). --Multiple submissions (submitting the same paper for more than one class). Course Readings: Articles are uploaded to Canvas. You are required to purchase one book, which you can find at the UO Bookstore: Fresh Fruit, Broken Bodies: Migrant Farmworkers in the United States, by Seth Holmes. WEEK ONE: Introduction 1/4 Kleinman, Arthur & Adriana Petryna. 2002. “Health: Anthropological Aspects.” International Encyclopedia of the Social and Behavioral Sciences, Pp. 6495-6499. London: Elsevier Science Ltd. 1/6 Nichter, Mark. 2010. “Idioms of Distress Revisited.” Culture, Medicine and Psychiatry 34:401-416. WEEK TWO: Shamans, Healers and Magic 1/11 Evans-Pritchard, E.E. 2010. “The Notion of Witchcraft Explains Unfortunate Events.” In A Reader in Medical Anthropology: Theoretical Trajectories, Emergent Realities, Byron Good et al. Eds, Pp. 18-25. Blackwell. Fotiou, Evgenia. 2010. “Encounters with Sorcery: An Ethnographer’s Account.” Anthropology and Humanism 35(2): 192-203. Optional reading on ayahuasca by Professor Lewis: “Ayahuasca and Spiritual Crisis.” Film: Robert Lemelson’s The Bird Dancer, 38 mins. Elemental Productions. (screened in class) 1/13 Cassaniti, Julia and Tanya Luhrmann. 2014. “The Cultural Kindling of Spiritual Experiences.” Current Anthropology 55(10):333-343. DUE: Discussion Section Exercise #1 (Film Critic-Style Review) 3 WEEK THREE: Health, Race and Inequality 1/20 Link, Bruce G. & Jo Phelan. 1995. “Social Conditions as Fundamental Causes of Disease.” Journal of Health and Social Behavior 35:80-94. Kawachi, Ichiro, Norman Daniels and Dean E. Robinson. 2005. “Health Disparities by Race and Class: Why Both Matter.” Health Affairs 24(2):343-352. **In-Class Quiz, Wednesday January 20** WEEK FOUR: Health, Race and Inequality Con’t 1/25 Holmes, Seth. 2013. Fresh Fruit, Broken Bodies: Migrant Farm Workers in the United States. Berkeley: University of California Press. Chapters 1-3. 1/27 Holmes, Seth. 2013. Fresh Fruit, Broken Bodies: Migrant Farm Workers in the United States. Berkeley: University of California Press. Chapters 4-7. **Guest Speaker, Dr. Heather McClure on the Latino Health Paradox** DUE: Discussion Section Exercise #2 (Brainstorm questions for mid-term) WEEK FIVE: Global Care 2/1 Redfield, Peter. 2005. “Doctors, Borders and Life in Crisis.” Cultural Anthropology 20(3):328-361. 2/3 Petryna, Adriana. 2005. “Ethical Variability: Drug Development and Globalizing Clinical Trials.” American Ethnologist 32(2): 183-197. DUE: Discussion Section Exercise #3 (Defining key concepts) WEEK SIX: Medicine, Technology and Ethics 2/8 **In-Class Midterm** 2/10 Fairchild, Amy & Ronald Bayer. 1999. “The Uses and Abuses of Tuskegee.” Science 284:919-21. Zimmer, Carol. 2013. “A Family Consents to a Medical Gift, 62 Years Later.” New York Times, August 7. 4 WEEK SEVEN: Gender/Sexuality 2/15 Montgomery, Anne. 2015. “Voice, Boundary Work, and Visibility in Research on Sex Work in Morocco.” Medical Anthropology 34(1):24-38. 2/17 Butler, Judith. 2001. “Doing Justice to Someone: Sex Reassignment and Allegories of Transsexuality.” GLQ 7(4):621-636. DUE: Exercise #4: “Trigger Warnings” assignment WEEK EIGHT: Global HIV/AIDS 2/22 Farmer, Paul. 1997. “On Suffering and Structural Violence: A View from Below.” In Social Suffering, Arthur Kleinman, Veena Das and Margaret Lock, Eds., Pp. 261-284. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. 2/24 Kenworthy, Nora. 2014. “A Manufactu(RED) Ethics: Labor, HIV, and the Body in Lesotho’s ‘Sweat-free’ Garment Industry.” Medical Anthropology Quarterly 28(4):459- 474. **In-Class Quiz, Wednesday Feb 24** WEEK NINE: Aging, Death, and Palliative Care 2/29 Desjarlais, Robert. 2014. “Liberation upon Hearing: Voice, Morality, and Death in a Buddhist World.” Ethos 42(1): 101-118. 3/2 Farman, Abou. 2013. “Speculative Matter: Secular Bodies, Minds, and Persons.” Cultural Anthropology 28(4):737-759. DUE: Exercise #5: Death With Dignity assignment **Guest speaker will join us to talk about end-of-life care in Oregon** WEEK TEN: Culture and Mental Health 3/7 Watters, Ethan. The Americanization of Mental Illness. New York Times (Jan 8, 2010). Fein, Elizabeth (2015). No One Has to Be Your Friend: Asperger’s Syndrome and the Vicious Cycle of Social Disorder in Late Modern Identity Markets. Ethos 43(1):82-107. 3/9 Lewis, Sara (2013). Trauma and the Making of Flexible Minds. Ethos 41(3):313-336. 5 **Final Exam, Tuesday March 15, Submitted to Canvas by 11:59pm** Due: Tuesday, March 14 by 11:59pm, submitted to Canvas. (Click on final exam prompt under Assignments and you will see where to upload the paper, which needs to be in MS Word or PDF format). If you do not submit in these formats it will not upload. Be sure to leave yourself enough time for submission: internet problems or computer glitches will not excuse you from the deadline unless there is a documented network problem on campus. Prompt: Drawing on what you learned in this course you will respond to 6 out of 8 short answer questions. Exams that earn high marks will articulate an argument and use course readings as evidence to support claims. You may reflect on lecture, films, and discussion section to guide you, but your evidence should come directly from course readings. Please use one citation style, such as AAA, APA, MLA or Chicago that includes internal citations and a bibliography. Responses should be approximately 300 words. Longer answers are not necessarily better answers. Assessment: This paper is worth 30% of your grade; for every day late you will lose 1/3 a letter grade (e.g. if you earn a B it becomes a B-). No late papers will be accepted after June 12.